In recent years, articles such as bottles have been secured with cartons in groups within a case. In one particular application, the case contains twenty-four bottles, and four plastic cartons are forced down over the top of the bottles so that each of the cartons secures six bottles together. The cartons are provided with holes in the main body portion which are inserted over the tops or necks of the bottles and, when pressed down over the bottles, firmly grip the bottles and hold them in packages. Finger openings are also provided in the main body portion of the cartons so that the packages can be readily removed from the case. In most operations, the cases are cardboard boxes, however, they may be constructed of any conventional materials such as plastic or wood. Heretofore, the cartons were positioned in stacks adjacent one end of the machine and vacuum gripping devices were utilitzed for gripping two of the cartons simultaneously from adjacent stacks and placing them onto a chute that carries the cartons to the bottles. One problem with such vacuum devices is that sometimes a positive grip is not obtained and the cartons are dropped while they are being moved to the chute that carries them to the bottles, or are not pulled from the stack. Furthermore, if there is not a firm and positive gripping relationship between the vacuum mechanism and the carton, the carton would tend to slip relative to the vacuum cap and not be properly positioned and deposited on the chute. Many things could cause these problems; for example, when the vacuum caps begin to wear, the reliability of the gripping action decreases.
After the plastic cartons have been positioned on top of the bottles carried within the case, they have to be pressed down securely over the neck of the bottle in order to produce a secure package. In one particular machine, a roller having recesses in its periphery is used for pressing the plastic cartons down over the top of the bottles. One problem encountered with this method is that if the roller is not properly positioned relative to the bottles carried in the case, the carton and, in particular, a portion of the carton extending around the end bottles will not be pressed down over the bottles the entire extent and when the package is lifted, the loose bottles will drop out of the package.
In our co-pending application, Ser. No. 06/205,194, there is disclosed a machine which is provided for placing the cartons on top of bottles loaded in a case. These cartons are fed from a plurality of stacks of cartons and allowed to flow down by gravity a chute which terminates adjacent the top of a case of bottles. As the bottles in the case flow therebelow, it engages cartons and pulls the cartons over the bottles. A presser foot is then used for pressing the cartons down over the top of the bottles. While the device disclosed in our co-pending application works satisfactorily, it has been found that it is desired to have a more positive gripping action when removing the cartons from the plurality of stacks. In our co-pending device, movable fingers are inserted through holes provided in the carton and projections extend outwardly therefrom to be positioned between the last carton and the next to the last carton. Once the projections extend laterally outwardly from the fingers, the fingers are retracted and the last carton is deposited on the inclined chute. If the main body portion of the cartons are jammed tightly together, it sometimes becomes difficult to separate the last carton in the stack from the next to the last carton and more than one carton will be dispensed from the stack at a time.